Utz Schäffer Editor Behavioral Controlling Anniversary Volume in Honor of Jürgen Weber Behavioral Controlling Utz Schäffer (Editor) Behavioral Controlling Anniversary Volume in Honor of Jürgen Weber Editor Utz Schäffer WHU – Otto Beisheim School of Management Vallendar, Germany ISBN 978-3-658-25982-2 ISBN 978-3-658-25983-9 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-25983-9 Springer Gabler © Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden GmbH, part of Springer Nature 2019 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. This Springer Gabler imprint is published by the registered company Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden GmbH part of Springer Nature. The registered company address is: Abraham-Lincoln-Str. 46, 65189 Wiesbaden, Germany Foreword Jürgen Weber has made a remarkable impact on the development of controlling as an academic discipline in German speaking countries. He is renowned for his ex- tensive range of interests and a behavioral perspective on controlling, an aspect that was foreign to the field in its early years. The reason we put together this publication was to mark Jürgen’s 65th birthday as well as his achievement of emeritus status at WHU. On such very special occasions, it is custo- mary in German speaking countries to honor the scholar celebrating such an anniversary with a festschrift. This would normally involve a small circle of students and people who are particularly close to the person being honored to recognize his or her achievements through the contribution of academic articles that would make reference to his or her work. However, we felt that this traditional form of festschrift was a bit outdated. Therefore, a new variation was selected in honor of Jürgen Weber’s 60th birthday. On this occasion, a number of former students and colleagues contributed brief texts in which they explained how Jürgen Weber had touched their lives and influenced the controlling community. In total, more than 60 contributions from academics and controlling professionals were re- ceived and they painted a complex and multilayered picture of a great personality and an outstanding controlling researcher. With us five years further down the line, we once again wanted to try something new. Our inspiration on this occasion was the unfortunate reality that many of Jürgen Weber’s influential works are not accessible to the English speaking community. So with this fest- schrift, we are seeking to change that by publishing the English translations of twelve ar- ticles that have been written by Jürgen Weber and his co-authors. As the editor of this vol- ume, I selected the articles which, based on Google Scholar, have had the greatest impact to date. They offer a broad spectrum of topics from 1985 to 2018, and they are tied togeth- er by the perspective of behavioral controlling as it has developed over time. Given that evaluating impact through Google Scholar does have an inherent bias towards Jürgen We- ber’s older publications, I supplemented his nine most-cited articles with three of his papers that have been published in the past few years. And I also included an impressive publica- tion index citing all of Jürgen Weber’s works thus far – it contains more than 1,200 titles. At this point, I would like to thank everyone who has helped in terms of ma- king this project a success. First and foremost, my thanks go to Dr. Heather Fiala, who kindly took the lead in translating all twelve of the articles that are included in this book. I would also like to express my gratitude to Sabine Petrakakis for her dedication in overseeing the entire publication process and for compiling the pub- lication index, Prof. Dr. Marko Reimer and Prof. Dr. Barbara Weißenberger for pro- VI Foreword viding helpful advice regarding this project, as well as the Institute of Management Accounting and Control faculty – Prof. Dr. Lukas Löhlein, Prof. Dr. Daniel Schaupp, Dr. Max Margolin, and, again, Prof. Dr. Marko Reimer – for their dedicated assis- tance in ensuring the accuracy of the translations. Finally, I would like to thank the publishers of the original twelve articles for their cooperation regarding the publi- cation rights as well as Carina Berg and Susanne Göbel from Springer Gabler Ver- lag in Wiesbaden for their reliable and competent support in realizing this project. In closing, I would like to take this opportunity to wish you, Jürgen, a very hap- py 65th birthday and the best of luck in your (hopefully many more) years to come as an active professor emeritus at our institute in Vallendar! Utz Schäffer Vallendar, October 2018 Contents Cost accounting as a controlling instrument . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Jürgen Weber On the conception and self-conception of controlling . Propositions for consensus building . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 Hans-Ulrich Küpper, Jürgen Weber & André Zünd Selective cost accounting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33 Jürgen Weber Integrated planning – is it merely a myth? Planning in German companies is more in danger than you would think . . . . . 59 Jürgen Weber, Markus Hamprecht & Hanns Goeldel A method for generating performance measures for logistics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67 Jürgen Weber, Sebastian Kummer, Armin Großklaus, Harald Nippel & Dorothee Warnke Is ensuring management rationality the task of controlling? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87 Jürgen Weber & Utz Schäffer Controllers can learn from consultants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113 Utz Schäffer & Jürgen Weber Controlling – developmental trends and future perspectives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125 Jürgen Weber Controller roles . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145 Lukas Goretzki, Jürgen Weber & Susanne Zubler Digitalization will radically change controlling as we know it . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159 Utz Schäffer & Jürgen Weber VIII Contents Truly rational decisions . The next challenge for controlling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169 Utz Schäffer & Jürgen Weber Digitalization ante portas . The transformation of controlling as reflected in the third WHU study on the Future of Controlling . . . . . . . . . . . . 179 Utz Schäffer & Jürgen Weber Publications by Jürgen Weber . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191 Cost accounting as a controlling instrument*1 Jürgen Weber Cost accounting as a controlling instrument The information instrument “cost accounting” recently received harsh critique in the krp1.2The points introduced in this article, which summarize, explain, and dis- cuss the primary “highlights” of last year’s krp discussion forum and take advan- tage of the opportunity to provide a list of the fundamental elements of controlling- oriented cost accounting, will show that there is little reason for such criticism. For some time, cost accounting has developed from a “data graveyard” for reporting pur poses to an attractive “data supermarket” that provides top management with a broad assortment of meaningful information. Thus, cost accounting has become one of the most important tools in controlling. Cost accounting must address new challenges Cost accounting has long been one of the most unpopular and underappreciated tasks in companies. This was reflected in the image of cost accountants, themselves, who had neither the flair of a worldly sales person nor the scientific aura of a technician. Instead, they were more often associated with pocket protectors and mountains of lists and tables filled with numbers. The number nerd was often sought after for the position of cost accountant rather than the strategically thinking and business affine sales person for numbers, who seeks to use those numbers to effect change within the company. However, those times are coming to an end. As has been called for in the literature for quite some time, the conception and self-conception of the cost accountant is transitioning into that of a central consultant to the company’s top ma- nagement. Cost accounting should provide the information necessary to success- fully navigate the company through the growing competition. As is often the case, this mindset change was strongly facilitated by the introduction of a new buzzword from the USA – controlling. Often incorrectly translated as “control”, controlling aims to provide company executives with comprehensive support, an important part of which includes making the required information available. Thus, cost accounting represents a central area of controlling. * First published in German as: Weber, J. (1985). Kostenrechnung als Controllinginstru- ment. Kostenrechnungspraxis (special issue 1), 23–31. 1 krp is the abbreviation of Kostenrechnungspraxis, the former name of the Controlllíng & Management Review. © Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden GmbH, part of Springer Nature 2019 U. Schäffer (ed.), Behavioral Controlling, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-25983-9_1 2 Jürgen Weber ACCOUNTING OBJECTIVES Documentation objectives Disposition objectives Vatlausaktiso n Dboyc cuomste cnet nctoesrt pCcorpainclucetbursall iacfcott esr mCapinlrciimcueluastme coPnrtperlopalan prnerio naggnrda m coPnrpetrlpoaanl rpneir noagcneds s PRICE CALCULATION Valuation Valuation of e.g., acceptance e.g., selection of self-produced of additional of optimal inventory assets contract? production process From documentation to management accounting accounting Figure 1: Changes in accounting objectives regarding cost accounting This “mindset change” is also clearly evident when one examines the changes re- garding the importance of accounting objectives that have taken place in the last few years. Making cost information available for decision making and control purposes is increasingly becoming one of the key objectives, as displayed in figure 1. Since there is a diverse range of dispositions that are often of short duration and have a continually changing spectrum, cost accounting must move away from past orient- ed, cumbersome documentation practices that focus on specific tasks and towards flexible, future oriented management accounting that is “open” to diverse requests for information. Changes in accounting objectives – and only these – are, after all, the reason why traditional full cost accounting, which is still practiced in many companies, is increasingly unable to provide meaningful data. Price calculation, in particular, is a good example of this: in the planned economy of the 1930’s, the context in which the structure and content of full cost accounting was primarily shaped, the main focus was on calculating full cost prices – that is, inferring prices directly from cost accounting. In today’s market economy, in which prices are determined solely by supply and demand, cost accounting has the task of calculating differential mini- mum prices. In this context, just as for other accounting objectives related to deci- sion making, traditional full cost accounting is of little use. Thus, in many respects there is a need for revision and expansion, beginning with cost type accounting which is otherwise typically ignored.